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Int= eresting discussion!

A few m= ore points:  Later Alto II models used 16K chips and supported up to 25= 6K words of "extended memory.  This was managed by "bank registers" in I= /O space (see the Alto Hardware Manual on the net).  One could fairly e= asily access two banks, with slightly different microcode sequences, but wou= ld have to reload the bank registers to get at the other two banks.
It would have been possible to use these sort of like PDP 11 s= egment registers to do multiprogramming, but since the banks could only addr= ess 64K blocks without finer grain it would have been awkward.

I was at Stanford ISL starting in 1976, a= nd we had an 11/34 running V6 and later V7, and I started at PARC in 1977 as= an intern.  I think I can  attest that there was very little inte= rest in PARC for traditional OSs and quite a lot of interest in network serv= ices, GUIs, and programming technology (Mesa, Cedar, Smalltalk etc.). Folks w= ere certainly very familiar with time sharing (BCC crowd) and Tenex.  T= here were systems (like Smalltalk) that could run multiple applications at o= nce, but really until Cedar came along pretty much everyone used one applcat= ion at a time and "world swapped" to get to the executive or to switch appli= cations.

On Jul 9, 2023,= at 5:04 PM, Clem Cole <clemc@ccc.com> wrote:

=EF=BB=BF
Steve - I'm going to do a small rebutta= l here.   You ask an interesting question as we look back on h= istory, but to be honest I. think the real thing is that neither the Xerox f= olks nor the BTL folks in those days were actually paying that much attentio= n to each other AND they were considering different problems.   It= turns out, if they had "blended" their idea, maybe the workstation world th= at would be birthed in the mid-1980s might have been different.
=

O= n Sat, Jul 8, 2023 at 3:45=E2=80=AFAM steve jenkin <sjenkin@canb.auug.org.au> wrote:
What struck me reading this is t= he estimated price (~$10K) to build an Alto, elsewhere I=E2=80=99ve seen $12= K and 80 built in the first run.
 [ a note elsewhere says $4,000 on 128KB of RAM. 4k-bit or 16-kbit chip= s? unsure ]
I'm pretty sure t= he first Alto's used In= tel 1103A (1Kx1), although the Intel 2106 (4Kx1) was coming on the scene= - you would have to ask Roger Bates if he remembers, as I believe that he d= esigned the original memory boards for Alto. That said, by the time of the second generation Alto's, Roger and Chuck= switched to a Mostek MK4116 - at least, t= hat is my memory from the ones we had a CMU a few years later.
<= div>

I=E2=80=99d suggest three reasons:

        - The Consent Decree. AT&T couldn=E2=80=99t g= et into the Computer Market, only able to build computers for internal use.<= br>                 They didn=E2=80=99t n= eed GUI PC=E2=80=99s to run telephone exchanges.
Put differently -- solving different markets.  Xero= x was in the office automation business - which was based on selling paper f= or their coping machines.   Bob Taylor's real vision was that for a= ll of the "paperless office" comments of the day, he realized Xerox could se= ll way more paper if it were easier to produce.

The Alto was thinkin= g that at some time a currently very expensive piece of equipment (the compu= ter), would be cost-effective.  How would it be useful for an office?

        - Bell Labs management:
                they=E2=80=99d been b= urned by MULTICS and, rightly, refused the CSRC a PDP-10 in 1969.

        - Nobody =E2=80=99needed=E2=80=99 to save money b= uilding another DIY low-performance device.
                A home-grown superco= mputer maybe :)
BTL was trying to fi= gure out how to more efficiently write/program and deploy them to aid in run= ning a complex switching system - their business.&nb= sp;  Again the idea of a computing "utility" was often discussed. = Computers cost big money to buy, deploy and operate. How do you use them= better?

  


It=E2=80=99s an accident of history that PARC could=E2=80=99ve, but didn=E2=80= =99t, port Unix to the Alto in 1974.
Ouch ... not so fast.   First, the HW lacked an MMU. = ; I had to teach Roger how they worked 5 years later when we built Magnolia a= nd why they were a good idea [I did the basic design of the Magonia MMU so w= e could run UNIX].  I remember Roger telling me at the time, that Thack= er and Lampson didn't think they needed them if the computer was only being u= sed for one purpose. BTW: that was the same argument Jobs used a few years l= ater when Motorola offered them a= t a bargain price the optional MMU chip for the MAC design th= ey were developing because 68000 designers (Nick, Les, and team) had used PD= P-11s at Schumblege before then went to Motorola.  They knew that not h= aving an MMU was going to be a real problem, plus they had used a UNIX box t= o help design their chip.

Second, Ken does not do hi= s sabbatical to UCB until 1975.  While Butler still had a fondness for U= CB, there was not much interaction by then. At the time, the prima= ry computer at UCB was a CDC6600, and there was more influence from "up the h= ill" on EECS from LBL than from PARC [and remember that national labs like L= BL are primarily using supers from CDC and later Cray].  Also please re= member that the "CS" types on the ARPANET are PDP-10 folks.  UCB d= oes not have one.  In fact, the original ARPAnet connection eventually t= o Ing70 was a VDH interface that ran down the hill from the IMP at LBL, and t= hat would not come for a few years yet.

PARC had= much more influence at Stanford than at UCB. Stanford was on the ARPANET [U= CB was not for a long time yet] and Stanford was using PDP-10s.  PARC's= Frankenstein MAXC was a PDP-10 clone with an Alto for its front end instead= of a PDP-11.  


 
By V7 in 1978, my guess it was too late because both sides had locked in =E2= =80=98commercial=E2=80=99 positions and for PARC to rewrite code wasn=E2=80=99= t justified: =E2=80=9CIf it ain=E2=80=99t Broke=E2=80=9D=E2=80=A6
Hmmmm, the PARC folks were rewriting&= nbsp;code at this time.  The original Alto is mostly BCPL and "Nova-Cod= e" ( the original DG Nova microcode Bulter and Chuck created).  By= 1978, both Smalltalk and Cedar had been built at PARC.  Also, think ab= out why Ethernet was created?   Metcalfe and= Boggs proposed it as a way to connect the different processors in a high-en= d Xerox copier. It's used as a "network" that we know it was after they= built it.   PUP and things like the Press format [later XNS and I= nterpress come later].

So, I d= on't think it was anything more than just focus.  PARC was solving one p= roblem with the Alto and the BTL folks created UNIX to solve another.
3D""=E1=90=A7
= --Apple-Mail-21A570DA-2324-4197-BD21-E8C3B55BA64F--